Tuesday, 21 June 2016

As former chair of the National Association of Young People
In Care NAYPIC I write to you all in regards to the Children and Social Work
Bill 2016.

In 1987 when I became a Management Committee member of
London NAYPIC one of the first things I was tasked with was to feedback on the
green paper of what then became known as the 1989 Children Act, which I saw to
completion.

Although I was just 17 years old I had completed the Community
Care Course at Hammersmith and Fulham College and was well into completing my
first year at Brixton doing the Preliminary Course in Social Care PCSC.

I found that due to my care experience, the green paper
although somewhat lengthy, to my mind anyway, was not a difficult task to
feedback on. However when I gave it back both NAYPIC and the Children’s Legal
Centre with whom NAYPIC shared a building with both were stunned at the level
of detail, I had fed back on.

Many of you will now have gathered the why’s and wherefores
of what happened to NAYPIC and during my many years of service to the
organisation both paid, for 5 yrs as their London Development Officer and not
paid as their National Chair of the National Executive Committee for just one
year before Government closed NAYPIC and subsequently the rest of my life as
the commercial director very much unpaid and having spent hundreds of thousand
of pounds of my own money to advocate the deeply held belief in the loud voice
of the most vulnerable babies, children and young people in our society,
children in care, it is with utter horror to me personally that the 31 pages
Bill speeding it’s way to legislation has no place for the voice of those
children. This I find is an absolute affront to my life’s work.

So with this I make a proposal and I hope that you all take
notice and unilaterally agree that we should no longer silence the most
vulnerable in our society and in fact we should embrace the voices of all
children in the UK learning, our most heart felt lessons, from those that have
experienced, the roughest of deals, those through no fault of their own who are
in care, NAYPIC.

I accept the reality that like a speeding train this Bill is
on it’s way and many of you may think we have more in common than less when it
comes to caring for children but it is rights I am advocating for, rights that
will eventually come to children anyway with or without you.

I ask that our Bill be a part of your CSWB statutory Bill
but it is for us at last an independent budget by law, for the voice of all children in
the UK, 12 million pounds per year, for the 12 million children in the UK, by law.

For children have no financial muscle and no way of lobbying for their too, tin pot ideas or
their part in private or CIC shares, no way of real independence, so they need an economy that cannot be
taken away from them any more. And we should never ever be afraid of our
children’s voices as our lesson for future generations to come. Add in urgently the children's independent voice and budget by law.

The YE-HA (Youth Economy) Bill

Introduction

1.The
Children’s Act 1989 recognised that the welfare of the child is paramount and
set out an overarching system for safeguarding children and the roles different
agencies play. It introduces the concept of consulting children and young
people based on their age and understanding.

2.The
UN Convention on the Rights of the Child 1989 was ratified by the UK in 1991.
It set out the principle for a legal framework to underpin all aspects for the
care, development and education of all children. It sets out the first ever
right to ‘freedom of expression’ and ‘freedom of association’, for children to
meet and form associations.

3.The
Government having considered over 30 public inquiries into child care since the
1970’s should adhere to these recommendations in both the Children Act 1989 and
the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child 1989 legislations and these
recommendations should now be built upon. The current child sexual abuse inquiry will look into the local authorities 'duty of care' a legal term, yet the Children and Social Work Bill proposes to suspend all 'duties' again a legal term for the next 6 years, ironic?

4.There
is no central agency that expresses the child’s view-point on any issue of
public importance that concerns children and young people directly. In fact
most agencies pay mere lip service to consumer involvement and may just tick
boxes to adhere to ‘freedom of expression’ legislation by using token
representatives, from think tanks to government working parties. Children and
young people do not run most if not all, child consumer organisations. Their
governance is made up of senior adults often with establishment links. Many
consumer child-care groups are reliant on government or other funding. This
cannot allow them any freedom to express themselves.

5.It
is time we act on children’s rights legislation as a matter of urgency. In the
face of political resistance to investigating matters of historical abuse we
may not ever be able to truly understand the magnitude to which children have
suffered in the past. However for us to change the course of history currently,
rather than wait on yet another public inquiry, we must be able to see and hear
and firmly put the child in the public eye immediately.

6.Proposal
to
be voted on in this Bill is that each child & young person 18 and under
has a pound each year, in sterling, to be ring-fenced for the
twelve million children and young people in the UK from the Treasury.
This will
provide financial independence as a statutory right enshrining current
law in practical terms, to meet and form associations
and to have freedom of expression. It may in turn start to inform us the
public of the wishes
and feelings of the child in the UK preventing child abuse in the
future.

Fifteen Peers expressed concerns about Clause 15 of the Bill, which
introduces a fast-track process for removing rights and safeguards which
Lord Warner explained "have built up over many years—indeed, over many
decades".

Sweeping Powers'the Secretary of State may by regulation AMEND any part of the Bill for the purposes of cost'

About Me

I would like those who know about abuse to break ranks, whether you are in a society or club or are the head of state I believe you care. So show it. Take direct action on the internet, start a petition under an alias, explode in your own PR very significant abuses in all of our human rights, if you are that clever then educate and give us all a chance to participate but do not do nothing... for when they screw your grand child you will be blamed as an apathetic generation who did nothing even though you knew.. BREAK RANKS THEY DO NOT CARE - ABOUT You and there is always something you CAN do... BREAK RANKS... BREAK RANKS and You yes You too all of you, just do it and be proud to... you owe it to yourself finally